


Blanky v. Dundy: Ultimate Matchmaker

by sadsparties



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Awkward Flirting, Epic Friendship, Fluff and Humor, M/M, Matchmaking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:40:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24507049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sadsparties/pseuds/sadsparties
Summary: There’s a first-edition map on the line and Tom Blanky is nowt if not determined.
Relationships: Captain Francis Crozier/Commander James Fitzjames, Thomas Blanky & Captain Francis Crozier
Comments: 28
Kudos: 104





	Blanky v. Dundy: Ultimate Matchmaker

**Author's Note:**

> 😎

It wasn’t that he really cared for a guinea—he wasn’t even sure if Silver here actually had it—but Tom reckoned that if he were to keep his sen entertained as they prepared for the walk out, he might as well do it while giving Francis a leg up. 

And that was saying something, seeing as he didn’t have as many as he used to.

He’d put it around two weeks or so since that wretched attempt at a bit of fun. Tom knew Fitzjames had mounted it at his own advice, which is why he feels responsible for the lad’s happiness as well. After the burial, the commander had spent the following days out of sight from the men, skulking in his bunk, declining his own steward, and only surfacing from his cabin when Francis summoned him to Terror. 

It was a sad sight, like a fire going out, and might be that was the time Tom realized that the commander wasn’t the double-plated blow-hard that Tom first presumed him to be. 

Well, he weren't  _ just.  _

It was the second week or so of these daily meetings, with Francis making some remark what made Fitzjames smile, his eyes twinkling like stars as Jopson poured a brew between them, that Tom noticed Lieutenant Le Vesconte observing them out of the tail of his eyes. Le Vesconte had on a thinking look, which Tom didn’t know he could do, then furtively met his eyes across the table.

“What do you make of that then?” the lieutenant asked him when they found themselves alone in Terror’s Great Cabin. Francis had mentioned such and such book and insisted that Fitzjames follow him to the library. 

“Seems to us as they’ve finally dinged their heads together and decided to be chums,” Tom said. “About time, too.” 

“Yes. Well.” 

Le Vesconte pressed his lips together and frowned at his tea. He would do poorly on a stage, Tom thought, if that was how he made a choker lie. Tom knew what was weighing on the lieutenant, but he would rather it come from Silver here than give Francis away. 

“It seemed to me that there was more to it than that,” Le Vesconte finally said.

“More?”

_ “Much more.” _

“Lad,” Tom began, and he rather thought he were entitled to address the lieutenant that way. “It’s best you get to the business end, you see. Alex keeps a neat shelf, and the captains will be back as quick as you worry down that biscuit.” 

And so it came to be that Terror’s ice master and Erebus’ senior lieutenant had wagered on who could first drive their captains to be “more than chums,  _ much more”.  _ Le Vesconte—“call me Dundy, if it suits you”— had placed his lucky guinea on the line, not currently on his person, he was afraid, but locked up nice and tidy in his cabin; whereas Tom had wagered his detailed, first-edition map of Boothia Peninsula, with a signed dedication by Sir James Clark Ross his sen.

Again, Tom didn’t really care for the guinea, but between dreaming of Esther and missing his sprog, he had to have a bit of bo-peep to preserve his sanity. What he didn’t know then, was that he ought to have demanded more than a gold coin if he were going to have to sit through Silver’s embarrassing attempt at matchmaking. 

“And as you see, Captain, this young Mr. Easy gets in all manner of scrapes, and it is up to his new friend Mesty to get him out of it lest he suffer the cane.”

Francis in the midst of confusion was a sight to see, because often he assumed that he was the butt of the joke. He would scrunch up his nose and narrow his eyes and you would feel like a boy being bully-ragged by your ma.

“Am I to take it, Lieutenant, that Captain Fitzjames has also enjoyed the charity of a corporal?”

“Oh, no, not at all! Nothing as spurious as that. In fact, the very opposite. If you recall, Captain, as I had mentioned a moment ago, that Mr. Easy is the son of philosophizing parents, who have spoiled him and inflicted their morals of equality to him. Very like James, you see. That is one of his many aspects which I admire—his tendency to judge a man based on his actions, not the merits appointed to him by others. Such esteemable sentiment towards his fellow man is—” 

“Say no more,” Francis interrupted. Tom reckoned that Francis thought he had the meat of it, which he didn’t, but he were only too glad to put an end to Le Vesconte’s sad display.

“You may go to Doctor Macdonald yourself and ask if he will spare you a copy from the library. I am sure it will be no trouble. Now if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I will see what James has been occupied with on deck.”

“‘Esteemable sentiment’?” Tom repeated after the door slid closed. Le Vesconte had buried his face on the table. “We’re not in Lady Jane’s parlour, Lieutenant. You’ve got to give it straight or you’ll end up with nowt, trying to get through Francis’s skull like that.”

“My cousins made it look so easy,” Le Vesconte groaned against the mahogany. “They’d jabber on at afternoon calls about their projects for captain-this and old missus-that, like it was some game, and in a fortnight I would hear the two engaged. It’s sorcery, I tell you!”

Le Vesconte heaved a long sigh, and Tom thought he ought to pat him in the back for his troubles. Silver here was simply getting a dollop of how Francis could also fail to see things right in front of his button. He tended to, when it came to these matters; God knows Tom’s come to grief for it back in them days. 

“There, lad. Let it out now,” he said as he awkwardly poked at the flat of Le Vesconte’s epaulettes. It seemed to work, because the lieutenant recovered from the shiny surface of the table and gave a right harrumph.

“No matter,” he declared. “This is only the first attempt. I will prevail!” 

Tom would’ve been moved if Le Vesconte hadn’t punctuated it by gorging on pork pie.

  
  
  


Tom Blanky was a master of tact. He knew his place, knew when to shut up and when to speak his piece. One of the advantages of having your close friend as your mark was you could already tell if taking them aside and making yourself plain wouldn’t be up to it. Tom had to do something underhanded, and he recognized what Fitzjames was key. He knew fairly little about the commander, but from that risky confession he made on sticking it to Captain Ross—and Fitzjames’s reaction to it—he figured he had the shape of the man. 

As his dear Esther said, nowt breeded closeness than sharing secrets, and if he were to incite intimacy between the captains, then there was nothing to it but the revelation of something personal, preferably damning, between them. And from then, they would build trust, then respect, then whatever it was as Tom didn’t even try imagining lest he resemble a tomato whenever Francis entered the room.

And so it happened that a certain dress ended up in the bag Fitzjames used to carry his personals. 

Tom had found it by chance, during a minor task in Erebus accompanied by young Hartnell. They had been shuffling about the shelves of Erebus’ Great Cabin, looking for their good maps, when a shiny fabric caught Tom’s eye. It was the sleeves of a woman’s dress, a dull red that looked almost brown, but somehow it had stood out amidst the pile of cloth what was left of Fitzjames’s Carnivale costume. Tom took note of it, and after a nice chat with Mr. Bridgens, put two and two together. 

From where he stood in the corridor in officers’ country, Tom heard Fitzjames gasp.

“What is it?” he heard Francis say, concern in his voice. A chair scraped across Terror’s floor and Francis’s heavy tread thudded across the room. 

Fitzjames made to placate him. “Nothing. It is—oh, Francis... ” 

Put it down to Tom’s age but he barely heard what happened next. There was fumbling and shuffling and some right pointed whispers; he could only imagine what they was talking about. 

Tom had seen Francis soft with the freshest ship’s boys, so he knew he were capable of giving comfort. Might be Francis would be flummoxed at first, what with the dress and all, but at Fitzjames’s uneasy expression he would go moony-eyed. Might be this very minute assuring Fitzjames that all was well and that they would find out which cretin would pull their bells this way. Might be taking Fitzjames by the arms and smoothing his palms over the sides. Might be taking Fitzjames’s hand and pressing it to his lips, warm and pliant.…

Tom was considering going to Le Vesconte this afternoon and demanding his due, when he heard Francis clearing his throat.

“I don’t suppose you, uhmm, that is, you can wear it, if it pleases you.”

_ Hell fire, _ Tom thought.  _ Francis, you dog!  _

Before he could even hear summat he would regret, Tom bounded for the fo’c’sle, bumping against Jopson along the way, and summoned as much noise as possible that the bosun gave him dirty looks. He was never this obnoxious, but for Francis he would summon a ruckus that would overshadow whatever suspicious noises could be coming from the Great Cabin.

  
  
  


All this to say that Tom still wasn’t sure what had occurred between the captains that day. Francis wasn’t volunteering it, and with Fitzjames nestled securely in Erebus what with a deal of weather about for three days now, Tom couldn’t tell if their regard for each other had changed. 

Francis wasn’t faring better for it, Tom saw. He were out of the swill and all the less narky for it, but with the ship’s creaking and groaning and his favourite commander out of his sight and arms, Francis was beginning to descend back into that black place what plagued him in the worst of nights.

“Three pound for your thoughts?” Tom said. 

Francis swung round to him from the hand-organ. He’d cranked it to some slow, sappy music that had his eyes glaze over and his lips curve into a smile that Tom just about reached the end of it. 

Francis’s smile widened into a sly grin. “Do you have it with you or should I have to ask the purser?”

“What’s that now? A friend would count a coin unnecessary, mind.”

“A joke, Thomas.”

“Aye.”

“But if you must know, I was thinking about, well, tailors.”

As far as Tom remembered, Francis’s involvement with tailors only went up to dropping off the navy’s pattern to have a set made.

“Do you recall dropping off the navy’s pattern at the tailors to have a set made? They fashioned it in wool as regulation dictated. But I was considering, well, for social occasions, how it would be if I had an evening vest done in velvet. What do you say to red? Or one of those darker kinds; I suppose they call it burgundy? Have you worn velvet, Thomas? Never you mind, I should think Esther probably has. I might ask her for advice should we ever get back.”

_ God’s blood. _

“Francis,” Tom had to check, “have you gone barmy?”

Tom knew the drink could have lasting effects, even after having pledged away from it, but whatever it was that Francis could have said was interrupted by the bang of the main hatch opening, followed by a chorus of heavy boots and cheers from the men. Jopson entered the Great Cabin and announced that Captain Fitzjames and a few Erebites had boarded Terror.

“In this weather?” Francis asked. He was stiff and alert in an instant, incredulous and worried and lovesick at the same time.

His question was answered by none other than Fitzjames, who strode into the room like a man on a mission. He stopped when he caught sight of Francis, the tension in his shoulders easing. 

“Francis,” said Fitzjames dreamily. “You’re a welcome sight.”

What was a man to say to that? Apparently nothing if you were Francis Crozier, who, instead of replying, began to gently lead Fitzjames to the brazier and worry at the clasps of his wet slops. The commander was flushed from his trek across the storm, the ends of his hair curling, and the ice in his slops beginning to melt and cause the air around him to waver. Tom had to admit he could see the appeal.

A low greeting came from behind him: “Mr. Blanky.”

Tom looked behind to find Le Vesconte and Bridgens hovering at the entrance of the room. Le Vesconte looked right pleased.

“Lieutenant,” he returned, followed by a huff and a slight shake of the head.

“Don’t lose your hair over it, Francis. We are perfectly fine,” Fitzjames declared over Francis’s fussing. His melancholy merely a week ago seemed to have dissipated. “Only we’ve stripped the ship bare in trying to find a set of missing maps. I was all but ready to crack open the water tanks when Dundy here suggested that we benefit from your collection instead.”

Tom quickly flitted an eye over the lieutenant.

“And so we donned our slops and added tacks to our boots. Mr. Bridgens volunteered to accompany us should our new wedges be in need of—” 

The music from the hand-organ reached a crescendo, and Fitzjames turned his attention to it, delighted.

“A concert! Have you a talent for the instrument, Francis, or do you content yourself with listening?”

Tom loved Francis, truly, but he wouldn’t deny his sen the tickle of seeing Francis flush and colour as red as he would under the sun.

“Oh, no! We were just, Tom and I were just—”

“That’s lovely,” James said, fondly, with no hint of ridicule. “Liszt, isn’t it? I saw him play once, in a music hall in Herefordshire.”

And, by sheer serendipity, the music from the hand-organ slowed and shifted to a melody what reminded one of green pastures and fair weather and golden afternoons with the missus. At least that was how Tom heard it. He could only imagine what bells were ringing in Francis’s ears as he gazed into Fitzjames’s deep, brown eyes.

A slight cough interrupted their thoughts, and they all looked to Jopson, who had come in with a tray at his side. “If the lieutenant and Mr. Bridgens might proceed to the wardroom, I’ve laid out refreshments for you. For Mr. Blanky as well.”

Le Vesconte turned to Tom with a gesture that said ‘after you’ and an expression that said ‘do not foil my hard work now’. Tom rolled his eyes. He ought to have stayed, if only to witness Francis fumbling and being embarrassing, but Jopson’s brows had risen higher and higher the longer he delayed, and in the end they had followed him solemnly into the next room. 

“Finally being clever about it, are you?,” Tom said once Bridgens had made his excuses to have a bit of grog with the lads. He took a sip of his coffee.

“I must admit it was a lucky quiff, on my part,” Le Vesconte said. “James’s mood was quickly going sour, and I reckoned that if the charts had truly gone missing, then I could improve the occasion by giving him reason to see the captain.”

“I’ll return the charts to you then, after this. I questioned it myself when Francis told me to borrow them from Erebus, but I suppose that was you all long, though I don’t know how you convinced Francis in the first place. Well played, Lieutenant. Well played.”

Tom lifted his cup and invited Le Vesconte for a toast. The coffee was still hot and it had burned his tongue, but he might as well have a laugh at Silver’s expense for all his trouble. 

But the lieutenant only gave him an odd look, perplexed. “Borrow the charts, you say?”

  
  
  


It may well have been Providence who stayed the storm for three more days in worse form, with hale and wind wreaking havoc to the deck. All the better for Le Vesconte, who’d gone about it like a man on a benjo as the captains spent the better part of the nights laying out their plans in the privacy of the Great Cabin. They was clean tuckered out, Tom could tell. Sometimes, Francis would be eagerly trading old stories with Tom, when he would flinch and knead at his back, the knot there getting worse as they hunched over memoirs and accounts for the planned route.

It weren’t so good for young Hartnell too, whose instructional on reading the ice had to be put off. Or for Alex, who’d opted to sleep in the sickbay to avoid the draft in his room that wouldn’t close. And it certainly weren’t a boss time for the men, who had been in the middle of lugging their possessions to the sledges when the storm came upon them. The wind had ripped the sails covering the boats, exposing the contents therein and squandering their hard work. It called to Tom’s mind the bad years in Somerset Island, the wasted miles of surveying ahead then hurrying back to haul under sun and storm. He told as much to Francis that the damage had set them back a week, at least.

Francis nodded sordidly to all this, deep in thought as he usually was, but his mind was obviously elsewhere. That very morning the weather had improved and Fitzjames had seen it fit to remove back to Erebus and see if Collins had kept her whole. Only two hours since then, give or take, and Francis’s eyes were already glazed. It right wouldn’t do.

Afore this, Tom would never have believed that Francis would be raked fore and aft with the likes of James Fitzjames. There was the slight incident with the Franklin girl before he left for Florence. But that was, hell, almost three years ago now, and as far as James Ross had whispered to Tom it were all for nowt, and it was highly unlikely what Francis would find someone in the voyage who were as dainty and charming as Sophia Cracroft.

But then there had been the fire. And there had been Francis standing over Fitzjames, rebuffed. And after that, well, Tom had heard from Jopson, who’d heard from Bridgens, that the captain had refused to leave Erebus until Fitzjames surfaced from his cabin with his uniform golds and his face ash-free. 

Maybe not dainty, Tom supposed, but certainly charming. And with tragedy knocking Fitzjames about, Francis must have seen summat beyond the gleam, beyond the shiny jewel, and discovered summat more delicate and precious.

“Keep him safe, won’t you, Old Tom? And ensure his judgment,” his old commander and friend had written to him. Tom had sent the younger Ross a happy missive in return, promising to do so and expecting full well that if he were to do any protecting, it would be from the brown or from Sir John smashing Francis’s pride to bits.

He hadn’t expected to look out for his heart too.

“Why don’t you balley round and see how the Erebites are doing? Give Fitzjames a how do.”

Francis turned to him from his intense inspection of the bowsprit, the fingers of his right hand tapping a silent melody on the gunwale. “As if I’ve not done so the past three days? No, and I won’t have him assuming that I can’t trust him to put his men in order.”

“He’ll hardly find it that way, I’m sure,” Tom insisted. “Might be he’d welcome your company too. It can’t be pleasant, cramped all day with almost a hundred men.”

“And one more would scarcely do better.”

“Oh aye? You can’t show yourself to just ‘one more’.”

“How do you mean?”

“You’re  _ much more. _ ”

And Tom was never any good with these things. He’ll talk about the ice, about what follies greater men had met in the ice. He’d always thought what if you find a pot of jam you like and if it likes you enough, you should take it home—but for this he could give no advice. 

Nowt breeded closeness than sharing secrets, and if that was the case then the opposite must be true: the closer you were, the easier it was to share a part of you. In that moment Tom wondered if Francis would tell it plain, if their years together were enough, if their nights spent watching the stars would allow another confession to pass between them.

Francis’s searching eyes penetrated his. There was a step there, the kind that you made in a dark staircase, with your vision blind as a bat and your arms out at the ready in case you fall. Francis bit his lip, imploring.

“Do you think I’ve gone barmy, pursuing this?”

Tom would catch him, always.

“Aye,” he said. “But don’t we all, when it comes to this?”

Francis let out a single laugh, the wet kind tinged with relief. He closed his eyes and breathed deep, his breath coming out white in the frost. 

Tom straightened and cleared his throat. “And you should make yourself seen. Leave it to Edward to take the helm for a bit.”

“A safe way to test his mettle.”

“Too right, see if he’s up to it. Especially if he were to lead the last mile while you curse your old joints.”

Francis gave him a playful shove at that, and the ship rang with Tom’s cackle. No dark stairwells here—only old friends and the trusted deck beneath them. 

Francis squeezed Tom’s shoulder as he proceeded to the main hatch. Jopson was waiting down below, ready with his slops.

  
  
  


And Tom really would have let it go then. He reckoned it was best to have Francis and Fitzjames go at it their own way. Right good if they ever figured it out, and better for Tom too if they was to stop those deep sighs and thwarted gazes that made Tom want to tear his remaining leg out. 

If they didn’t, then might be it was all for the best as well—to have Francis build a new life in London, lovingly smothered by little versions of Ross and Esther till he could rust in with a lass who would have him as he was. 

Tom would let Le Vesconte know. He would tell him to spare his lucky coin, and to forget his prized map, too. 

Or so he would have. Until Le Vesconte showed up in Terror’s wardroom looking like he’d done someone a treat and the Met was on his heels for it.

“Cheese and Crust, what now?”

“Hush!”

Le Vesconte peered back into the corridor before resolutely sliding the door closed. He removed from his slops a small notebook covered in well-oiled leather.

“They’re in the Great Cabin. Again,” Le Vesconte said. “One would think they were trying to commit each word of their plans to memory. Anyhow, James is already in his slops, and I need only a moment to put my plan in place.”

“Listen, lad,” Tom began. “It’s time we tidied this up. I’ve got a bright, young duck to train and Fitzjames has you going through the sick list everyday—we’ve barely time to be playing drawing room matches. You keep your jimmie and I keep my chart, and we’ll both consider this a bit of fun.”

Fitzjames and Le Vesconte were a pair of ganders, Tom knew. It was why they got along so well. It was also why they expressed their disappointment the same way, that is to say, they would pin their fingers to their chest, reel back, then drop open their jaw as if Tom had just said something salacious about their mothers.

“What O! I don’t see why you should retreat from the Rubicon at this moment, Mr. Blanky, not when I am so close! If you must know, I had no intention whatsoever to claim your prized map, knowing full well what it should mean to you, but there was a wager, and therefore items must be put on the table. My sole reason for suggesting this contest was the mere sport of it. I was dreadfully bored, and will be so again now that victory is at hand.”

Tom arched his brow at that. “What the devil have you got there?”

Le Vesconte held the notebook to his chest like it contained the recipe for Lady Jane’s Christmas pudding. “Only the most incriminating of proofs,” he said.

“Lieutenant Le Vesconte,” Tom said, and here he had to be firm, because even though Silver Head had outdone his sen, it was slightly concerning how easy it was to sneak into the captain’s cabin of a navy ship and candle about, “have you stolen your captain’s private log?”

Le Vesconte grinned from ear to ear. “Oh, even better. I must say, Mr. Blanky, even if James were not to publish his memoirs, this alone would fetch a pretty price,” was what he said, shortly before flicking the notebook open. 

Tom peered closer as Le Vesconte flipped through the notebook. Inside was page upon page of sketches, drawn up in either ink or watercolours. There was the usual summats what artists drew—flowers in vases, obviously drawn before the voyage; Erebus and Terror docked in the Orkneys; Lancaster Sound. 

Then there were portraits of the crew, some drawn with only a few lines but the visage still recognizable—Mr. Collins in his diving suit, Fagin the cat—“Here we are,” said Le Vesconte—and, appearing with more and more frequency: Francis at the foretop, his coat and cap mistaking him for no one else; Francis at the stern, laughing at a joke that the figure beside him just made. Tom squinted his eyes and, yes, that was his own nose it was. 

Le Vesconte turned another page and there again was Francis, in his writing desk filling the captain’s log under the light of a lantern. Another page: Francis in the same position, but with his head twisted to the side to where the artist would have sat, sketching.

“Well,” was all Tom could say. 

Le Vesconte was no better. His reply was brief and reverent: “Indeed.”

Tom shook his head and straightened, the last portrait remaining fresh in his mind. Francis had looked so unguarded. His gaze to the unseen artist looked warm, happy,  _ at peace _ . “What do you mean to do with this then?” Tom asked.

“Nothing too complicated, as I learned from my previous attempts. When James departs the Great Cabin, Captain Crozier will escort him to the deck, as is his won’t. I shall then sneak back in and leave this on the seats. He’s bound to find it, and if not, then our loyal Jopson would ensure it ends up in his possession.”

A solid plan, Tom thought, though there was still the risk of some other officer walking in and finding it. Would they understand what it was? Probably not, but it was best not to leave it to chance. Tom was about to suggest that Le Vesconte leave it inside Francis’s cabin when a cry ripped through the silence.

Tom spun his head to the refreshments counter, befuddled. The cry had come from within the room, not from the hall, and it was a short one at that, like a hand had smothered it mid-way. Fully alert now, Le Vesconte quickly hid the notebook inside his slops. “Is that…”

Together, they approached the far wall, Tom taking care to silence his steps. With the entire crew employed in packing the boats, the ship had no shortage of activity. The entire vessel was filled with a myriad of sounds—the floor creaking, boots stomping, plates and cutlery clanking, and, undermining it all, the incessant groaning. It was difficult to get it off your ear once you’d gotten used to it, but as Tom listened closely, there it was again—the higher pitch of a human groan, the steady thumping of a blunt object against the bulkhead, another cry, and, God Almighty, Francis’s name! 

“Good evening.”

Tom was never no coward, he’ll swear to any god, but at the sound of Thomas Jopson’s clipped voice at their backs, Tom could confess that he right near pissed his unders. He and Le Vesconte whirled round to see Jopson carrying a tray of snacks, perfectly composed and resolutely unaware of the growing racket from the opposite side of the bulkhead.

“Sirs?” Jopson said. “You both look pale. Shall I call for Doctor MacDonald?”

Tom’s thoughts whirled. Could he not hear? Could he possibly not recognize the unmistakable sound of two people in enthusiastic congr— 

But then Jopson arched his brow, the sight so familiar in Francis’s own face that he must be doing it on purpose. The lad fucking knew. 

It was then that he realized what Jopson had said.  _ Alex  _ knew _.  _ The surgeon shared the other wall of Francis’s cabin; no wonder he’d avoided it like the plague.

“Or maybe not,” Jopson continued, politely ignoring what Tom guessed would be his and Le Vesconte’s gobsmacked expressions. He placed the tray on the table.

“Perhaps a fresh cup of tea would be enough to recover you,” he said. “I’ve found its results favourable, especially during all these weeks of hard work. It’s no easy task, making sure that two people remain undisturbed for hours at a time. The number of messages I’ve had to take, the made-up chores I’ve had to give officers to send them away...” 

Jopson took a slight step towards them, the light from the lamps painting his pale eyes almost white. “I would be very upset if someone spoiled my efforts.”

Tom remembered it now—Jopson plying the wardroom with endless servings of biscuits and tea; Jopson lingering in the corridor to the Great Cabin like a regular mongoose; Jopson with an unusual message from Francis, that Tom ought to go to Erebus and find a certain sea-chart from a certain chest near Fitzjames’s cabin.

A figure entered the room hastily.

“Seems they’re still at it, Thomas. Should you find any of his clothes again, you may trust Henry to send it over and I—”

Bridgens really ought to be more careful, Tom thought. It was a steward’s job to check a room before entering, and placid though his face may be, his thick, lovely brows did nothing to conceal his rising panic.

“Never you mind us, John,” said Jopson. “Everything is in order, or will be.”

Jopson gave them a sly smile, and it was at this point Tom remembered that afore tying neckerchiefs and pouring Allsopp’s, Thomas Jopson had been hunting down slave-traders in the Atlantic for a living. Tom’s eyes flitted to the tea tray, where a butter knife lay within a foot of Jopson’s hand.

Le Vesconte cleared his throat.

“Quite right, sir, I mean, Mr. Jopson. Quite right.” Le Vesconte laughed, high and jittery, then turned sharply to Tom. “What say you we go on deck and have a smoke, Mr. Blanky? Lovely view out, with the stars and all.”

“It’s a waxy moon,” Jopson helpfully provided.

“Yes, uhmm, yes, a lovely view nevertheless. There’s nothing quite as riveting a sight as the silent pack stretching on for miles and miles under the light of—”

“What he means,” Tom interjected, “is that the lieutenant and I have had a long day, and we was so tuckered out we had a kip right here in the wardroom. Peaceful as kittens, we was. Couldn’t wake us with a roundshot. Right, Lieutenant?”

Le Vesconte could only nod. 

“And now,” Tom said, “I think we’ll smoke a pipe on deck. Lovely view out, waxy moon and all.”

Jopson darted his steely gaze between them, and it was as if an invisible thumb was pressing into the bob of their throats.  _ Keep still, _ Tom thought.  _ It only hunts you if you’re running away. _

Jopson’s eyes met Tom’s and lingered, and in there Tom saw many things: a stern warning, a second stern warning, and something familiar, a loyalty to Francis so deep that he would follow his captain to the edge of the world.

Tom couldn’t help but smile; Jopson smiled back.

Finally, the steward stepped aside, granting them safe passage out of the room. 

“A good idea, sirs,” he said. “And I wish you, as our captains have of late, a very good evening.”

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies to people who actually speak the Yorkshire dialect. 😄


End file.
